Flexible liners having a generally cubical configuration have been previously used for various shipping and storage containers. Typically, these liners have four sidewalls, a bottom wall interconnecting the sidewalls and optionally may have a top defining an enclosure with a spout or an access opening through one or both of the top and bottom walls to facilitate filling and emptying the liner. Such liners may be received within or surrounding a container to prevent leakage of the contents of the container and to prevent contaminants from entering the container.
Current liners are typically of approximately the same dimension as the container with which they are used and, especially when received within the container, provide little protection to the exterior of the container as it is being filled. Thus, when pouring a liquid into an inner liner of a cardboard box for example, splashing, sloshing or overfilling of the liquid within the liner can ruin the cardboard box. To further protect the container it is desirable in some instances to fold the liner over the upper edge of the container at least when filling and emptying the container. This is difficult, if not impossible, to do when the liner has a smaller cross-sectional area than the outside of the container which is especially true with insulated containers, such as used for ice cream, which may have a wall thickness of 11/2 inches or more. Also, current liners are not readily adaptable to various container configurations such as square, rectangular or round or cylindrical and usually result in a reduction of the effective volume of the container due to the excess material of the liner stuffed into the container and the resulting poor fit of the liner within the container. The excess material may also become folded in the container and thereby trap some of the contents of the liner therein preventing the liner from being completely emptied and wasting a portion of the contents. Further, the liner may become bunched up or snagged within the container which may result in high stresses on portions of the liner which can reduce the reliability and even rupture the liner in use.